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MLB Volunteers - News & Announcements

MLB Volunteers

News & Announcements

Major League Baseball was hit Monday in New York state court with a putative class action alleging the league violated state wage laws by failing to pay volunteers who staffed the fan festival surrounding the 2013 all-star game. John Chen, who volunteered to staff MLB’s “All-Star FanFest” in the summer of 2013, lodged putative class allegations that he and others should have been paid for the tasks they performed during the week-long set of events around the professional baseball league’s all-star game. The 2013 all-star game took place in New York City and, among other events, FanFest...

A New York judge has tossed out a lawsuit by a volunteer at last July's baseball All-Star FanFest who claimed 2,000 volunteers should have been paid by Major League Baseball. Federal Judge John Koeltl (KOHT'-uhl) in Manhattan says the league was protected by an exemption from federal minimum wage laws for temporary amusement or recreation establishment events. The judge's findings were released publicly Wednesday. John Chen's lawsuit had sought lost wages. He said federal and state minimum wage laws were violated when the league recruited volunteers to operate 40 attractions at an event...

Next month, more than 150,000 people will be in the city of Austin to attend South by Southwest, which started in 1987 as a tiny indie festival but has blossomed into a nine-day conference featuring the hottest names in music and film and politics and computers. There will be live performances and movie premieres alongside panel discussions addressing everything under the hot Texas sun. It’s Coachella mixed with TED talks and some Sundance; a sort of Burning Man for brands, corporate and personal, that is forecast to inject more than $200 million into the local economy. SXSW will be hosting...

Use of Volunteers Questioned as N.F.L. Revenue Soars Volunteerism has become as much a part of the Super Bowl as the Roman numeral identification of games, allowing those who cannot attend the games to be a part of the festivities by welcoming those who can. When the Super Bowl was last played in a cold-weather city, with the Giants edging the New England Patriots, 21-17, in Indianapolis to close the 2011 season, members of both teams were left with a warm and fuzzy feeling. They received blue-and-white scarves that were knitted by members of the community and that featured a logo patch sewn...

A volunteer at Major League Baseball's 2013 All-Star FanFest in New York is suing the organization for unpaid wages. John Chen, one of about 2,000 volunteers at last month's event, billed as "the largest interactive baseball theme park in the world," is being represented by Outten and Golden LLP, which successfully represented two unpaid interns seeking pay for their work on the film "Black Swan," ABC News reported Friday. Chen's lawsuit, which lawyers said they hope to turn into a class action suit, alleges the league violated the Fair Labor Standards Act and New York Labor Law by failing to...

A volunteer of the 2013 All-Star FanFest is suing Major League Baseball for unpaid wages and is represented by a law firm that won a high-profile judgment in favor of unpaid interns. Major League Baseball hosted its FanFest, what it called "the largest interactive baseball theme park in the world," in New York City last month with the help of about 2,000 volunteers. The five-day All-Star weekend events were sponsored by large corporations and brought about $191.5 million into the New York City economy, the league has claimed. The lawsuit, filed on Wednesday with the U.S. District Court for...

John Chen and several others who worked at the Major League Baseball All-Star Game FanFest have filed a complaint against the league seeking class-action status for a lawsuit alleging the league violated federal and state minimum-wage laws. The complaint, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, seeks to stop MLB from accepting work from unpaid volunteers and recover unpaid wages for the volunteers’ work at FanFest. The workers filed the complaint at a time when unpaid interns across the country are filing suits against prominent media companies such as Fox...

You’d think a $7-billion-a-year industry, built on the backs of fans who shell out hundreds a game for tickets, could afford to pay workers to staff a fan festival at one of its biggest attractions. That’s the argument being made by a Queens man, who filed suit against Major League Baseball yesterday saying he should be paid for the work he did as one of 2,000 volunteers who staffed last month’s All-Star Game FanFest at the Javits Center. The class-action suit, filed yesterday in Manhattan federal court on behalf of John Chen, of Rego Park, seeks lost wages for the 17 hours he worked at the...

Major League Baseball has violated state and federal employment laws by staffing its lucrative All-Star FanFest events with unpaid volunteers, according to a class action lawsuit filed Wednesday in New York. The complaint targets MLB's annual FanFest event, described by the league as an “interactive baseball theme park,” which has become a fixture of the All-Star Game weekend. The five-day 2013 All-Star Weekend event in New York City generated approximately $191.5 million for the local economy and was sponsored by at least 15 major U.S. corporations, according to the complaint. The most...

Major League Baseball staffed its "lucrative, for-profit" 2013 All-Star FanFest with thousands of unpaid volunteers in violation of state and federal law, according to a federal class action. Lead plaintiff John Chen says he and about 2,000 other volunteers worked FanFest, an interactive baseball theme park described as "baseball heaven on earth." They allegedly helped with hospitality, event logistics, community events and transportation for the 40 attractions included with admission, such as a home run derby and an all-star legends and celebrity softball game. The main event was an all-star...

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On August 7, 2013, Outten & Golden LLP filed a lawsuit against Major League Baseball on behalf of unpaid All-Star Game FanFest volunteers and other volunteers who performed unpaid work for Major League Baseball alleging the following: MLB...

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